ORLANDO--With all the pressures on healthcare, many organizations are embracing innovation as a means to help reduce costs while improving care quality and patient outcomes. Three representatives from organizations with innovation programs shared their experiences during a panel session at the Innovation Symposium at the Health Information and Management Systems Society annual conference.

ORLANDO--More than seven million patient medical records were breached in 2013, which is a 138 percent increase over 2012, according to Brian Evans, principal consultant at Tom Walsh Consulting, who spoke during a session on breach incident response at the Health Information and Management Systems Society annual conference.

ORLANDO--Five percent of patients consume 43 percent of total healthcare costs. To drive down expenditures, the healthcare industry needs to target the most chronically ill patients, who are managed by multiple physicians and often take as many as 25 prescription medications, said Mark T. Bertolini, chairman, CEO and president of Aetna in his keynote speech at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society annual meeting.

It’s the first official day of HIMSS14 but we attended several of the pre-conference symposia yesterday to get you up to speed on the latest health IT news. Here’s what you need to know.